Advent has four weeks

MT. 24: 37-44

FIRST SUNDAY OF ADVENT 2010

I had an advent mentality, the time when we look forward to something. I was looking forward to Black Friday, the big shopping day after Thanksgiving. I planned ahead, so to to begin shopping on the day before Thanksgiving. I read ads, and checked emails from the stores. I was ready. I found great bargains on the things I was looking for. I ignored the Mac Computer and Nike Sports Gear stores. They rarely have good sales. I knew which stores to go to and where they were. I was in LA with my sister Jane. There were lots of people just like me, looking for those bargains. Some people worked in teams so they could get to stores simultaneously, when sales were the deepest. Some sales ended at 4 AM and some began at 4 AM. One store ended its best sales at 10 AM. But I did OK.

Afterwards, I sat down to open the scriptures for the first Sunday in Advent. I was condemned by the Gospel! I was not waiting and planning on the coming of Jesus. I was focused on shopping. I had not been spending weeks thinking about the coming of Jesus. I was like the people who were not ready for the flood in Noah’s day. It is not that shopping for bargains is wrong. It is that I was out of balance. I was not thinking at all about Jesus, and thinking a whole lot about shopping.

What is the Good News here? Well, Advent has four weeks. I have some time to get my priorities balanced. Christmas can be a nice balance of gifts and the coming of Jesus as gift in my life. I can still go about my day to include shopping. In the gospel it says two people were doing the same thing. One was taken and the other was left. Was there someone in the stores with me who seemed to be doing just what I was doing, but was also focused interiorly on the coming of Jesus into their life?

I hope I can become as good at welcoming Jesus as I am in welcoming a great bargain in the store. Maybe, in time, I can become even more welcoming of Jesus into my daily life, and little concerned about having more “stuff.”